The kennels sat below a shallow rise and would thus be visible from the upper floors of the house. Three lodges of whitewashed stone, two cupolas apiece, were arranged side by side, such that the first and third buildings had extensive attached fenced runs fanning outward. The central building, likely for whelping, equipment, grooming, storage, and preparation of food, had three smaller runs projecting behind it.
A lone hound, gray about the muzzle, lounged outside the central building. He lifted his eyebrows when I approached, then his head, then—old habits died hard—groaned himself upright and deigned to sniff my hand. I crouched to give his ears a proper scratch, assailed by the fragrance of happily muddy dog.
“That would be Zeus,” said an older man who’d emerged from the kennel. He wore a kilt that might have been woven in a hunting plaid pattern some time in the last century. Now his attire was so much nondescript brown wool, a battered leather sporran hanging from his waist. “Zeus is grandsire to Thales. Earned the freedom of the shire, he has. You’d be the fella what found the Valmond stripling.”
I was a lord, not a fella. The Valmond stripling was a courtesy viscount of adult years, albeit barely, and heir to an earldom. I rose, stiff in my own haunches, and bowed.
“Lord Julian Caldicott, of Caldicott Hall.” This man was at least two decades my senior, and more to the point, he was likely the most knowledgeable source of information about the missing canine prodigy. Then too, the foxhunting community, for all its protocol, was also notoriously democratic. A kennel master was a respected figure in those circles, and thus I kept my manners about me. “Mr. Banter has asked me to find Thales.”
“I’m MacNeil. Everybody calls me Mac. Good luck finding a beast that’s been at liberty for days. My boy is halfway to Harrogate by now.”
MacNeil was burly, disheveled, and redolent of hound. His demeanor was pure yeoman, with particularly dusty boots. He clasped a cold pipe between his teeth, and thus his burr had a growled quality.
“Has Thales gone absent without leave before?”
MacNeil gestured to a bench situated between the first and second lodges. “Been a long day, what with himself in the boughs. You mustn’t pass this along to himself, but yes, Thales has enjoyed an occasional experiment in spontaneous liberty. Himself would sack me if he knew that, but sometimes, a young lad needs to stretch his legs and sniff a few badger holes, you know?”
“Silforth begrudges his hounds some freedom?” As best I recalled, hounds were usually exercised at length at least three days a week out of season, taken for hours-long walks as a pack over hill and dale.
MacNeil sat himself down upon the bench, produced a pouch of tobacco and a peculiar little instrument that might have begun life as a horseshoe nail, one end sharp, the other flattened. He scraped at the bowl of his pipe and tapped the results out against the sole of his disreputable boot.
“A good foxhound can think for himself,” MacNeil said, “but he hunts with his pack, lives with his pack. If Thales’s occasional solitary outing became known, Squire would fret.” MacNeil filled his pipe with tobacco and tamped it down just so with the flattened end of the nail. “Gi’e us a moment.”
He rose and went into the building, and when he returned, he was wreathed in pipe smoke. The scent was as rich and mellow as any I’d sniffed in a posh London gentleman’s club.
“Miss Lizzie gets the good quality leaf for me,” MacNeil said, re-settling himself on the bench. “Takes proper care of the staff, she does.”
Real affection and genuine respect underlay that observation. “Silforth is more focused on the hounds and horses?”
“Aye, in that order, and Thales most of all. If Squire’s firstborn and Thales were both drowning in yonder river, I’m not sure which he’d try to save first.”
Not intended as a compliment. “Why tell me these things?”
“Missus said you were comin’ doon from London, and I wasn’t to give you my usual dour Scottish airs, though if you prefer, I’ll cease bein’ so sociable.”
For a mere houndsman in humble attire and dirty boots, MacNeil was well spoken, but then, the Scots were fiends for education.
I presumed on his sociability and joined him on the bench. “Where do you think Thales got off to, and how did he get free?”
MacNeil drew on his pipe until the contents of the bowl glowed red. “The lad is fit, sir. Fit as only a hound in his prime can be. When I said he’d be halfway to Harrogate, I wasn’t exaggerating. Thirty mile’ a day is nothing for a foxhound like Thales. A morning romp. Give him a nap and some tucker, he’s ready to do the same that afternoon.”
I’d known as much, but the foxhound’s enormous energy was balanced with other qualities—a pleasant disposition, for one. “He’s off alone, away from his pack and the owner who dotes on him. I thought foxhounds preferred to bide in company.”
“Most do, but Squire decided Thales was special the day he was whelped. Thales had the run of the house, once he was weaned. When we came to Bloomfield, nothing would do, but that Thales spend spring and summer with the Squire. Foolishness, if you ask me. A foxhound isn’t a pet. He’s a highly trained, valuable beast with a job until he’s a pensioner like old Zeus. Trying to domesticate him simply confuses the poor fellow.”
And Silforth had insisted on domesticating his prize hound. “You don’t think much of Silforth.”
MacNeil cradled his pipe in a calloused hand. “I don’t think much of most people. Hounds are more loyal to their own and have more sense than your average human. You never saw a hound going to war against his own kind. Scrappin’ and sortin’ matters out from time to time, I’ll grant ye, but not premeditated slaughter of his kith and kin. He doesn’t duel to the death over a minor insult. No creature is that stupid save for man.”
Having seen war firsthand, I was inclined to agree with MacNeil’s logic. “How did a loyal, sensible hound make good his escape, and who might think to steal him?”
MacNeil took a particularly long time answering. “Everybody hereabouts knows Thales. A thief would have to get him up to London, and there he’d be just another cur for the baiters. Not worth the bother when London has plenty of strays with lots of fight in ’em.”
“What about a huntsman from Kent, Surrey, or Berkshire who has seen Thales working? Would another hunt steal him?”
MacNeil turned rheumy blue eyes on me. “Ye’re fanciful, my lord, but then, there’s nowt so queer as folk, as we say in the north. If it’s a prank, Squire might see the prankster laughing all the way to the assizes. The thief can’t hunt with the beast, unless he’s bound for Cumbria or Ireland. The hunting community is… not closeknit, but small enough that talk travels quickly. It’s a guild, and Squire dwells at its center.”
MacNeil’s blunt judgments were leaving something unsaid, something even more uncomfortable than disrespect for his employer and the whole guild of hard-drinking, hard-riding gentry.
“Somebody killed Thales?” Duels had been fought over less, feuds started over as much. No wonder Banter wanted the dog found.
MacNeil rose and shoved the pipe into a pocket. “You said it, not me, but I know a thing or two about that hound and his haunts. He’s never been gone this long before. If he’s still alive, he’s not on home turf, my lord, and not at liberty. Hasn’t been for days.”
I rose as well, my hips and back again protesting. I was not yet thirty years old, but war aged a man. Being taken captive by the French could nearly put period to his reason, if not his existence.
“Show me where Thales was last seen, if you please, and tell me who might want him dead.”
The days were growing shorter, a mercy to my eyes and an advantage to a tracker. Low-angled light often revealed what sunshine from directly overhead did not. Evening approached, and as MacNeil led me along a path that skirted the Bloomfield park, I was struck by what a pretty, peaceful parcel Banter owned.
A large stream or small river meandered along the back of the park, and a lush stand of hardwoods rose up on the far side of the water. Game would be abundant—for the owner of the property—and irrigation easy in the dry years.
“Bloomfield’s a good fixture,” MacNeil said, following my gaze to the Downs in the distance. “Very little of the land is boggy, and the grazing is excellent. Makes for good bones. We’ve a few hills for those inclined to a view and enough stiles and walls to keep the first flight occupied. Tenants weren’t too happy when Squire opened the property to the hunt, but they aren’t any happier when Reynard decimates their chickens.”
“And how often has that happened?”
MacNeil took a turn that cut across a corner of the park. “Rarely, if a man tends to his outbuildings, and I know what you’ll say next: Foxes aren’t like wolves. They don’t indulge in overkill, not even after a hard winter. They catch their supper, then take it off to a safe place to eat, or to be eaten by their kits. Very reasonable creatures, foxes. I suggest you don’t air that line of thinking before the squire.”
“I’m here to find missing property, MacNeil. I’m a soldier no longer and much prefer it that way. Silforth can indulge in his spats and skirmishes with somebody else.”
MacNeil took another turn that led back into the woods and then along the river. We reached a depression not visible from the house or park. Tall trees and bracken on three sides sheltered the path, and the river formed the fourth side.
“Squire says he stopped here to chat with Sir Rupert Giddings. The paths along the water are common rights-of-way. Not even the king can keep folk off, not legally. Giddings was on foot with one of his beagles. Thales was with Squire, both dogs unleashed. Squire and Sir Rupert got to… discussing, Thales and the beagle went off to nose about the undergrowth, as canines will do.”
Significant facts were being left out of this recounting. “The beagle was female?”
“Not a bitch, a pensioner. Still spry. Name of Merlin. Fine beast. When Sir Rupert called, Merlin presented himself in due course. Thales was nowhere to be found. Sir Rupert went on about his business, and Squire assumed Thales was following some line of scent, but Thales hasn’t been seen since.”
“You’ve tried putting other hounds on Thales’s scent?”
“No point. We walk the pack down this path frequently, and if Squire has gone up to Town or off to guest-ride with another hunt, we don’t bother with leashes and coupling. Thales’s scent will be all over this area.”
The spot was secluded enough to be ideal for a dognapping, and if the thief had somehow carried his booty downstream—or popped Thales into a nearby punt—the track would be impossible to follow.
“How deep is the water?”
“Depends where you cross. Bloomfield ford is about a quarter mile that way,”—he gestured with his chin in the direction of the manor—“and stepping stones and boulders about thirty yards that way, but even this time of year, the center will be four feet deep from here into the village.”
Scent hounds could pick up a line even in standing water, but if Thales regularly splashed and cavorted along this streambank, the challenge would be considerable.
I hunkered down to consider the pattern of vegetation along the dusty track. From the height of a man’s eyes, the undergrowth formed a uniform border along the path, but at dog height, the view was more revealing.
“A game trail,” I said, rising and pointing to a thicket of raspberry canes. “A protected path down to the water for the denizens of the forest. Sniffing along that trail would be like reading the Evening Tattler for a pair of scent hounds.”
“You’ll need a cutlass to get through those thorns.”
I didn’t need to get through them. I had only to pick up the trail on the far side of the raspberry patch. MacNeil trundled along with me, grumbling in his native Erse. I grasped about half of what he said, thanks to serving in an army that had recruited heavily from the Highlands—foolish this, English that, dimwitted the other. On the Peninsula, battle commands had been given in English and Gaelic, so dependent had Wellington been on his Scottish and Irish soldiers.
In the darker shadows of the forest, the trail was a bit elusive, but taking a lower perspective again soon bore fruit. I removed my spectacles and paced along the track, seeing an occasional cloven hoofprint, a single hair caught on a low-hanging branch, and other indicia of passing traffic.
“They came this way,” I said, noting two clear paw prints. “That’s the beagle.”
MacNeil peered at my find. “Could be a fox.”
The moment became delicate, but I decided that MacNeil could tolerate some direct speech from the visiting English dimwit.
“Fox prints are different from dog prints in several regards. The pads in the center of the foot are nearly touching on the dog, but spaced on the fox. The orientation of the claws is slightly different, and on the fox, the forward and side toes are spaced not to overlap, while on the dog they usually do.” Had we a clear line of tracks or two sets to compare, I would also have pointed out that foxes tended to travel in more of a straight fashion, while dog tracks could be a trifle offset between back and front paws.
MacNeil was looking at me as if I’d burst forth into song. “So the beagle came this way.”
I was already moving, looking for twigs or branches bent at foxhound height, larger paw prints, anything to indicate…
“Thales was here,” I said, squatting beside a beautifully formed largish paw print. “Or a dog of his dimensions passed this way. You can see the beginnings of dust in the track. If you had rain five days ago, and Thales left this impression on the dampish dirt four mornings ago, then the dust accumulation would have begun perhaps seventy-two hours ago, and—”
“Coulda been another dog, my lord. We don’t know that was Thales. If you go sounding the trumpet at the manor house, claiming we’ve found his trail, and you’re wrong, Squire will go very spare with the both of us.”
I straightened and considered the surrounding terrain. “Silforth can’t go spare with me. I’m a guest at the invitation of Bloomfield’s owner, and taking me to task for a reasonable supposition would be rude in the extreme.”
“You’re like a hound. You catch a whiff of scent, and your reason abandons you.”
I had been merely logical in my response to MacNeil, and I hadn’t even mentioned the obvious. I was a ducal heir. Silforth—who had apparently lost the dog in the first place—would go spare with me at his social peril.
“I was an intelligence officer in Spain,” I said, though I didn’t usually discuss my military past. “I like a good puzzle.” An understatement.
Recent events—at a house party nearer the coast, in the vicinity of Caldicott Hall, and in London itself—suggested I thrived on puzzles. In some way I could not articulate, solving other people’s mysteries gave back to me a sense of competence I’d lost in captivity.
“Fine, then. Tell Squire what we already knew—Thales came this way.”
I took one last look around in the direction Thales had been traveling. If I were a dog, what would interest me most in a pleasant wood that had enjoyed a good rain the night before? What would I avoid?
I kept my gaze on the ground as I worked forward from the clear prints. A forest floor, covered with bracken, moss, rocks, and the first leaves to drop from the canopy was not the best ground for tracking, but Thales was a good-sized creature, and he’d been enjoying the game trail with his beagle friend.
My efforts were rewarded some thirty yards from the raspberry patch. I took out a notebook and made a quick pencil sketch of what I’d found, and by the time MacNeil came muttering and cursing in my wake—dunderheaded English clown, or something like it—I had put my sketch away.
“If the manor serves supper at seven, I’d best be getting back,” I said. “I will make Silforth’s acquaintance, I trust?”
“Aye. He’s been haring around the countryside, insisting on poking his nose into all the neighbors’ kennels, and leaving a trail of insult from here to the Downs. They humor him, but he’s not the magistrate, and nobody in these surrounds would be stupid enough to keep Thales underfoot if they’d stolen him.”
One hoped Silforth wasn’t stupid enough to extend his search beyond friendly territory. Hubris like that could get a man called out.
“Then I will thank you for your time, MacNeil. If you recall anything relevant, please do send a note up to the manor.”
We left the woods and returned to the path, and MacNeil bade me a good evening at the turning along the park.
“Must you find the dog, my lord?”
Now he my-lorded me? “I will try my best.”
MacNeil’s gaze went to the manor house, sitting across the park, its windows gleaming an eerie pink in the setting sun.
“Might be better for the hound if we just left him to his own devices,” MacNeil said softly. “He’ll manage well enough on the occasional coney, and some yeoman will take him in come winter. Thales is friendly and sweet when he isn’t leading the pack.”
A true houndsman’s sentiment, and doubtless the equivalent of blasphemy from Silforth’s perspective.
“I might well fail, MacNeil. Thales has been gone for days, and efforts to find him have thus far been unavailing. As you said, he could be halfway to Harrogate by now, without any human assistance whatsoever.”
“Better than dying on three legs because he blundered into a badger trap.” He gave me a slight wave and disappeared into the lengthening shadows, muttering and cursing, cursing and muttering.
Before I subjected myself to the hospitality of the manor, I took out my sketch and examined it, adding a few lines while the impression was fresh in my mind.
A boot print had appeared beside a large, clear, dog paw print. The boot print was incomplete. Half the heel was clear, as was about two-thirds of the outside edge. The wearer had been substantial enough to leave a fairly deep impression in the soft earth, or had been moving through the bracken at some speed. I did not have enough of the outline to guess at the wearer’s exact height, but clearly, an adult had left that track.
The prints looked to have been made at the same time as Thales had investigated the game trail, though for all I knew, somebody had come along twenty minutes before the hound or three-quarters of an hour later.
I made my way across the park, sifting through facts and logic. Raspberry season was over. Poaching was illegal. The game trail was all but invisible to human eyes and hadn’t become any sort of shortcut through the woods a person could use.
If Thales was indeed halfway to Harrogate, that boot print supported the theory that he was making the journey in somebody’s dog cart. The situation as MacNeil had described it further suggested that the dognapper had been familiar enough with Thales and Merlin that neither foxhound nor beagle had sounded any alarm at the sight of an approaching human.
I put the sketch away, donned my eyeglasses, and, with the day’s fatigue once again slowing my steps, set out for the manor.